Corrected: Willits man pleads guilty to Virginia Beach killing

A Willits man serving in the Navy pleaded guilty Wednesday in a Virginia Beach courtroom to voluntary manslaughter in the July 2009 Virginia Beach stabbing death of a Navy colleague.

Paul Stephen Bricker, 27, could face between one and 10 years in prison at his August sentencing.

Bricker, a 2003 Willits High School graduate, served in the Navy with the victim, Chief Petty Officer Gerard Curran, 45.

Bricker told the court, Curran told him "he [Curran] wanted to commit suicide and he wanted his wife and children to receive government benefits after his death." Curran told Bricker he intended to make his death look like a robbery, but he needed Bricker's help in case he wasn't able to kill himself.

In April 2009, Curran had filed a false police report about being the victim of a home invasion, claiming he had been stabbed. Police determined the stabbing had been self-inflicted.

The two men met at the First Landing State Park on July 28 where Bricker told police, "Curran said, 'Let's get this over with.'" Bricker described how Curran strangled himself with a rubber physical therapy band until he collapsed.

After Curran went down, Bricker told the court he thought Curran was dead. Bricker then stabbed Curran once in the chest. After the stabbing, Bricker removed the knife and rubber band, leaving Curran lying on the ground.

Curran died of internal bleeding caused by a single stab wound to the chest that perforated a lung, according to an autopsy.

Bricker told the court he stabbed Curran because Curran had asked him for help.

"The investigation revealed no benefit, pecuniary or otherwise, to the defendant [Bricker] for his role in the victim's death," according to the stipulation signed by Commonwealth Attorney Harvey L. Bryant, III.

Curran was reported missing on July 30, 2009, a full two days after his wife said she had last heard from him. She told police Curran "left home to go jogging."

Police spotted Curran's car in a parking lot at the 2,888-acre First Landing State Park in Virginia Beach, Virginia, and that became the focus of the subsequent search.

The day and a half search for Curran involved more than 100 fellow sailors, police, search-and-rescue crews, family and friends.

The search made little headway until two women came forward on August 1 to say they saw Curran walking slowly in the park two days before. They described him as looking "depressed and tired, and would not make eye contact with them." The women actually waited to see which direction Curran went so they could walk in a separate direction. Shortly after the women came forward, Curran's body was found in a ravine off one of the main trails. His body was badly decomposed due to the extremely hot weather; the cause of death was originally classified as a possible suicide.

A joint investigation by Virginia Beach police and the Naval Criminal Investigation Service reclassified the death as a homicide and resulted in Bricker's arrest about a year later.

Bricker told police at first he refused to consider Curran's request, but after Curran became more desperate and insistent, he finally agreed. The two men spent nearly a month going on scouting expeditions around the area looking for a suitable location for Curran's death to be staged before settling on First Landing State Park.

Bricker told police the two men met at the park not far from one of the main hiking trails. The knife has never been found.

According to Navy sources, Bricker and Curran served together at the Naval Computer and Telecommunications Area Master Station Atlantic in Norfolk at the time of Curran's death, and had served together on the aircraft carrier USS Harry S. Truman between 2005 and 2007.